The teen’s handiwork was scrawled more than 900 times throughout the city of Vista, his graffiti moniker marked on everything from sidewalks and street signs to buildings and benches.

The 17-year-old vandal was ordered last week to complete a short stint in custody, get counseling and serve probation. But his parents are facing perhaps an even greater sentence: paying up to $266,000 in restitution to the city.

It’s a lesson the family is learning the hard way: If you spray, you (or your parents) will pay.

It's unlikely these Vista parents can. The teen’s father works for a printing business, and his mother has a minimum-wage job after being unemployed.

“In her economic situation, there’s no way she’s going to be able to pay it,” the boy’s attorney, Richard Arroyo, said of the mother. “It’s weighing heavily on her mind, but she understands he’s a minor, and she’s responsible for it.”

Restitution in graffiti cases around the region has soared over the past few years as law enforcement gets better at documenting graffiti and identifying vandals with Graffiti Tracker, a mapping software.

It cost taxpayers $16 million to remove graffiti scribbled over 619,000 square feet of the county in 2011. It’s no wonder local governments are coming to collect.

San Diego County restitution in 2011

“The cost of graffiti is terribly expensive to clean up by the city and often leaves permanent damage, such as gouges on stainless steel or windows,” said Gary McCarthy, a senior deputy city attorney in Escondido. “When we can identify the culprit, we do our best to hold them accountable.”

A Chula Vista mother said she nearly fainted when her teenage son’s restitution was initially put at $10,000. It was later reduced to $2,500.

“It’s very, very hard for me to pay restitution,” she said. “My husband and I both have decent jobs, but with the court costs, it’s really hard, and the restitution, that’s a lot.”

The families agreed to tell their stories as long as their names weren’t used because their children are minors.

Arroyo, who often defends kids charged with graffiti, said restitution amounts that reach into the thousands of dollars have become typical. But he said the costs are sometimes inflated and out-of-reach for cash-strapped families.

“That’s the reality out here. Cities aren’t going to get anything, and it burdens the parents and kid for a lifetime,” the Chula Vista-based lawyer said.

Game changer

In the past, it was common for taggers to be arrested on one or two counts, usually for the vandalism that cops actually witnessed. Other graffiti that popped up regularly was often cleaned by public works employees within a day or two. Most times, police didn’t have the time or staffing to go out and document each graffiti scrawl as evidence.

The cases — and the court-ordered restitution costs — were usually small.

That changed with Graffiti Tracker.

Escondido police became the first agency in the county to try it out in 2007. The program serves as a national graffiti database of taggers, their monikers and their damage.